Page 4061 - Week 13 - Wednesday, 26 November 2014
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video
That is the problem. It is well and good to talk about the biggest spend ever. At the heart of it is the spend on the hospital, but there is confusion with the hospital spend: they go to tender, they have select tenders, there are businesses doing a lot of work and making a lot of effort at great expense, and then the government change their mind—and change their mind continually. That is the problem with this government in the delivery of capital works. Are you getting value for money? The GDE was five or six years late and four times over budget. What about the dam? Which number do you want to pick? Pick a number—145, 410 or anywhere in between. This government does not deliver on time and on budget.
Then there was the AMC. We warned them. Minister Corbell was saying, “There is capacity here for 25 years.” We said, “Don’t cut the size.” It was to be 374 beds; it was cut to 300. The gym was dropped; the chapel was dropped; other facilities were dropped. What are we doing now? What is the budget this year, Mr Wall? It is $100 million extra for the AMC to do exactly what we warned the government they would have to do by cutting that. That is their record.
Let me look at part (2), which says “continue to monitor the impact on our economy”. They should be doing that anyway. It says “work closely with business”. You should work closely with business. But we have a Treasurer who says: “The private sector are not exactly stepping up to the plate at the moment, making large investments. Although we are seeking that, we are going overseas for that because we don’t think we’re going to get that locally.” The private sector is not stepping up? There is a lot of confidence there in the private sector.
The motion says:
… ensure that the strategic reforms underway across the ACTPS enhance the effectiveness and efficiency of government services …
Truly, that is a matter of course. It says:
… make strong representation to the Federal Government …
If you wanted to have any credibility on the call to make strong representations to the government, you might have done it when you had maximum efficiency at the federal level, when it was actually your party in government. But you squibbed it. You squibbed it as you have always done.
The problem is that the government do not really have a view about the private sector. They talk the talk, but they never deliver. Chief Minister Stanhope said that we would always be a public sector economy. There is, on record, the current Chief Minister saying exactly that. And we have quotes from the Treasurer where he says that he does not care where the jobs come from, public or private. If you are talking about building up a private sector and you say, “I do not mind where the employment comes from, regardless of whether they are in the public sector or the private sector,” where is your commitment?
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video